ARTS AND CULTURE BUDGET REMAINS AT E3.3M

LOBAMBA – The arts industry has welcomed the unchanged E3.3 million allocated for Eswatini National Council of Arts and Culture.

This amount was enunciated by Minister of Finance Neal Rijkenberg in his maiden E22.97 billion national budget for the 2019/20 financial year on Wednesday afternoon in Parliament.

The minister made it clear that the country was facing an unprecedented economic crisis. Therefore, a tighter budget would be made available until the situation

normalises

 When the Budget Speech for the 2017/2018 financial year was delivered, the allocation for Arts and Culture dropped from E4.2 million to E3.3 million. Independent calculations by the Entertainment Desk reflected that this drop was 21.4 per cent. 
Even this year’s tabled budget remained at E3.3 million.

The council is under the Ministry of Sports, Culture and Youth Affairs. In fact, the only time when ENCAC received an increment was in 2016 where the budget was increased from E2 313 360 to E3 313 360.

Since then, there has been no increase much to the detriment of artists due to the fact that this hinders on the implementation of crucial activities by the ENCAC that could possibly improve the local arts industry. Examples of such projects include, but are not limited to, provision of sufficient funding to host beauty pageants that align with international standards, bolstering the choral music industry and empowering musicians through offering more workshops and interactive sessions.

Afiliates

The ENCAC has affiliates which directly benefit from the tranches of money given to the council by government. These are Swaziland Arts and Music Association (SWAMA), Swaziland National Choral Music Association (SNCMA) and the Association of Christian Artists in Swaziland (ACASWA) among others.

ENCAC Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Stanley Dlamini said even though government remains committed to development of the arts industry, he was fully cognisant of the current fiscal challenges.
“It could have been better but with the current fiscal challenges, the allocation was the best they could give under the circumstances,” Dlamini acknowledged.

He stated that they had no choice but to align their projects with the allocated budget with the hope that partnering with the private sector would yield positive results. He mentioned that they did not have much expectation for an increased budget. Therefore, none of their planned projects would be affected.
SWAMA President Melusi ‘Zox’ Dlamini also welcomed the budget.

“If this is what was available, we are grateful. We would like to thank His Majesty’s government for sharing the little that they in the coffers with the arts industry. However, we hope things will get better in the not so distant future,” Dlamini said.

Members of Parliament (MPs) who actively participate in the music industry through production of their albums in the likes of Timothy Myeni of Nkilongo and Mduduzi ‘Gawuzela’ Simelane, who represents Siphofaneni, pleaded with government  to work extra hard to mutate the present state of affairs within the arts industry for the better.

“We are thankful for the current budget. We are praying that the current situation improves in the near future given the fact that the arts industry is a vital sector of the country,” Simelane said.
Meanwhile, the Youth Council was allocated a budget of E3.8 million, which also remained the same from the previous financial year.

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